RUB 



OR, BOTANICAL DICTIONARY. 



RUB 



489 



yellowish green colour, and are sometimes succeeded by 

 seeds, which seldom ripen in England ; berries dark purple. 

 Native of the south of Europe, the Levant, and Africa. 

 It is well known that this plant is so essential to dyers and 

 calico-printers, that without it they cannot carry on their 

 business. In England the consumption of it is so great, that 

 more than two millions sterling has been annually paid for 

 it in importations from foreign countries. This great demand 

 naturally directing the attention of British agriculturists to 

 the cultivation of the plant, the Society for the Encourage- 

 ment of Arts and Manufactures offered premiums ; and the 

 Madder of England has in consequence been so improved as 

 to be pronounced as good, if not better, than that imported 

 from abroad. This plant, with others of the same natural 

 order, appears to differ from other substances used for the 

 purpose of dyeing, in having the property of tinging with a 

 florid red colour, not only the milk, urine, &c. but even the 

 bones of those animals which have fed upon it. From various 

 recent experiments it appears, that the colouring matter of 

 Madder affects the bones in a very short time, and that the 

 hardest part of them first receives the red colour, which gra- 

 dually extends from the outside through the whole bony sub- 

 stance, so long as the animal continues to take the Madder ; 

 but if this root be alternately given and intermitted for a suf- 

 ficient length of time at proper intervals, the bones are found 

 to be coloured in a correspondent number of concentric circles. 

 Madder is frequently mentioned by the Greek writers, who 

 employed the roots with the same intentions as modern phy- 

 sicians. The roots have a bitterish and rather austere taste, 

 and a slight and not disagreeable smell. They impart a dark 

 red tincture to water ; but to rectified spirits, and to distilled 

 oils, only a bright red colour : both the watery and spirituous 

 tincture taste strongly of the plant. Medical men consider 

 Madder as a deobstruent, detergent, and diuretic ; and it is 

 chiefly used in the jaundice, dropsy, and other diseases sup- 

 posed to proceed from visceral obstructions, particularly those 

 of the liver and kidneys. Some modern writers have recom- 

 mended it as an emmenagogue, ami in rickety affections. 

 With regard to its diuretic quality, Dr. Cullen asserts that 

 it is not constant. As a remedy for the jaundice, it has the 

 authority of Sydenhara. That some French writers should 

 prescribe it in a rickety state of the bones, appears surprising, 

 "ce brute animals to which it was given, especially the 

 mnger, were considerably emaciated and weakened by its 

 Fects. Its virtues as an emmenagogue rest principally upon 

 the authority of Dr. Home, who gave from a scruple to half a 

 drachm of the powder, or two ounces of the decoction, three 

 or four times a day; but Dr. Cullen says, I know of other 

 practitioners in this country, who, after several ineffectual 

 trials made with it, have now entirely deserted its use. Pro- 

 payation and Culture. As it is from Holland principally that 

 we have been supplied with Madder ; and the best sort is cul- 

 tivated at Schowen in the island of Zealand ; we shall first 

 present a full detail of the manner of cultivating it in that 

 country, and then subjoin the most successful means that have 

 been used to cultivate it in Great Brtiain. A comparison of 

 one with the other may afford hints for very important improve- 

 ments, and assist the diligent and skilful fanner in the pro- 

 fitable cultivation of this very important article of trade. In 

 the Netherlands, the land designed to grow Madder, if strong 

 d heavy, is ploughed twice in the autumn, that the winter 

 >st may afterwards mellow and break the clods. In the 

 spring it is ploughed a third time, just before the planting of 



fdder. Light ground is 'only ploughed twice, and that in 

 spring; and at the last ploughing is divided into lands 

 ihree feet broad, with furrows between each land four or 







five inches deep. It requires a loamy substantial soil, not 

 too stiff and heavy, nor yet very light and sandy, for though 

 it may thrive tolerably well in the latter, still such land can- 

 not have a second crop of Madder planted upon it in less 

 than eight or ten years interval ; but in the isle of Schowen, 

 where the land is substantial, they need not stay longer than 

 three or four years, in which interval the ground is sown with 

 corn, or planted with any kind of pulse. In that island, a 

 gemet of land, which is three hundred square feet, will yield 

 from one thousand pounds to three thousand pounds weight, 

 according to the goodness of the laud and the favourableness 

 of the seasons; but in light land the quantity is from five 

 hundred to a thousand pounds weight. The time for plant- 

 ing Madder in Holland begins towards the end of April, and 

 continues through May ; and sometimes, in very backward 

 springs, there is some planted at the beginning of June. 

 The young shoots from the sides of the root are taken off 

 from the mother plant with as much root as possible ; these 

 are called kiemen, or slips, and are planted with an iron dib- 

 ble in rows at one foot asunder, and commonly four slips in 

 a row. The quantity of these slips planted in one gemet is 

 various; the price of the slips also varies according to the 

 state of the market. The first year that the Madder is 

 planted, it is customary to plant Cabbages or Dwarf Kidney 

 Beans in the furrows between the beds ; but there is always 

 great care taken to keep the grouad clean from weeds. In 

 September or October, when the young Madder is cleaned 

 for the last trme that season, the green haulm or stalks of 

 the plants are carefully spread down over the beds without 

 cutting any part off, and in November the Madder is covered 

 over the stalks with three or four inches of earth. This 

 covering is performed either with the plough or with the 

 spade ; the latter is the best, though not the cheapest method. 

 In the second year, at the beginning of April, which is about 

 the time the young shoots are beginning to come out, the 

 earth on the top of the beds is scuffled over and raked, to 

 destroy the young weeds, and make the surface smooth and 

 mellow, that the young shoots may more easily penetrate the 

 ground. In the second summer there is also the same care 

 taken to weed the Madder as in the first ; and then nothing 

 is planted or suffered to grow in the furrows. At the last 

 time of clearing the ground, in September or October, the 

 green haulm is again spread down upon the beds ; and in 

 November the Madder is again covered with earth in the 

 same manner as in the first year. By this method of culture, 

 it is easy to see how necessary it is to plant the Madder in 

 beds, for thereby it is much easier covered with the earth of 

 the furrows ; and the earth of the beds is every time height- 

 ened, which will greatly lengthen the roots ; hence the young 

 shoots will have longer necks, and, by thus being deeply 

 earthed, will put out more fibres, and have much better 

 roots, without which they will not grow ; and it is of equal 

 use to the mother plants, since in the length of their roots 

 consists the goodness and beauty of the Madder ; for those 

 which have but few main roots are not so much esteemed as 

 those which are well furnished with side-roots, called tengels: 

 a plant having many of these roots, is called a well-bearded 

 Madder plant. On this account the side-roots should never 

 be cut off, for, besides the loss of moisture, sometimes the 

 plants will droop and become weak, and will produce but 

 few young shoots, which are required in large numbers in 

 the spring, and are very profitable, if plentiful in the second 

 and third years. The Madder roots are seldom dug up by 

 the Dutch in the second year, but generally after it has 

 grown three summers; therefore the culture of the third year 

 is the same as in the second, during the spring and summer. 



